The menu was originally developed to support Colorado communities in guiding upstream community- and societal-level systems change strategies as part of the Community Organizing for Prevention program. The purpose of the menu is to highlight evidence-based and evidence-informed strategies that create systems changes within communities and environments to ultimately reduce risk factors and protect youth from adverse health and social outcomes. The focus of the strategies in this menu is only on local systems change, not on changes that might occur at the state or federal level.
The menu should be used as a foundation of information from which community coalitions can formulate more specific action plans to implement systems change strategies that have been selected based on local risk and protective factor data and diverse community buy-in. Learn more about the critical precursors to implementing these strategies. By understanding the local context in which these strategies will be implemented, communities can better tailor their efforts to align to specific community needs. There are many links to external references and resources in the menu that can be used across different communities to tailor these efforts.
Support Safe, Stable and Affordable Housing with Sustainably-Funded Programs and Policies
Make Community Assistance Programs and Resources More Accessible to Eligible Families
Expand Family Friendly Business Practices - Economic Stability
Enhance School Quality through Funding and Operational Improvements
Adopt School Policies and Practices that Promote Student Sense of Belonging
Increased Funding and Access to High Quality School-based Extracurricular Activities
Enhance School Quality through Funding and Operational Improvements
Adopt School Policies and Practices that Promote Student Sense of Belonging
The strategies included in this menu were identified using registries and lists that evaluate societal- and community-level prevention practices (see our Technical Appendix). The included strategies meet the following standards for inclusion:
Representation on at least one experimental research study and/or evaluation (usually multiple studies) that met the following criteria:
a. Addresses specified risk or protective factor or a significant related corresponding health outcome;
b. Utilizes rigorous quantitative evaluation methodologies, such as a randomized control trial, interrupted time series analysis, regression discontinuity, or other quasi-experimental designs (for example, propensity scoring for comparison communities);
c. Accounts for threats to external validity of study, including selection bias, sample bias, and baseline equivalency, statistical control, and assigned to conditions (in quasi-experimental studies);
d. Accounts for threats to internal validity of study (attrition rates and fidelity in implementation); and,
e. Demonstrates sustained outcomes over time.